The Scars Run Deep
by MistressHolbytla
Summary: Engaging drama and angst. Without laying a finger on Ponyboy, the socs take ultimate revenge. APOLOGY to all of my reviewers: It's been so long since I started this story that I am no longer motivated to finish it. 3 chapters are up, the rest...who knows
1. Prologue

A/N:  This story is not completed or almost completed, like some of the others I post, so it may take me a while to think of a decent plot.  I have ideas in my head, but I'm still contemplating.  

I have more after this prologue written already.

This story is going to be fairly violent… but not seriously violent.  Just a lot of beating up and stuff like that.  I don't do REALLY violent stuff, but this may be the worst violence I've written so far.  There's no profanity (mild, stuff, you know), because I don't do profanity.  

We all love to torture our favorite characters (well, most of us, anyway).  This story was written (mainly) about Sodapop, mostly for my own enjoyment.    
This story has a more complicated plot than some of my stories.  I'm not sure where I'm going with it yet.  I just thought I'd let you know that.  

Reviews are appreciated, but please understand my updates may be extremely slow because I am working on so many stories at the same time, as well as the fact that I have writing "moods" for different fan fiction stories. I'm a freshman in high school but taking quite a few honors and sophomore classes.  

Well, without further ado… 

**The Scars Run Deep**

(Prologue)

*Darry*

It's been three days since the disappearance.  Every day I wait for the news that he has been found, and every day I search on my own.  But we cannot find him.  These sleepless nights are catching up to me.  Silently I cry myself to sleep, unable to keep up the false front when no one is there to watch.  It seems that when I do sleep, my rest is awakened by nightmares of what they could be doing to him, either my own or the nightmares of my brother.  I vowed I would find him.  I vowed I would hold him in my arms again and let him know that I really did love him.  But now, I am afraid I will never get the chance.      

A/N:  Interesting?  Engaging?  Waiting for the next chapter? ;-)


	2. Disappearance

A/N:  Sorry for the shortness of the last chapter… I kinda thought everybody would understand that it was just a prologue, lol.  Well, anyways, this one isn't that lengthy either, but it's a lot longer… 

I always leave notes for those who reviewed for the first chapter (or section posted) of a story… 

Robot in Disguise:  My first reviewer!  Glad you found it interesting… hope you enjoy the rest!

Sodapop02:  You like my stories, don't you… hehe!  Glad you thought it was engaging!  I think you'll like this story!

JLCollett:  Glad somebody understands, lol… I've had chances to update my stories pretty frequently this week, however, because finals just ended and I have a three day weekend and no homework! Yay!

Naria4:  Here's your update. ;-)

Karlei Shaynner:  THANX FOR SAYING IT WAS AWESOME!  Here's your update!

Chloe:  Yup, I'd say this is pretty soon.

GageLuisSodabemine:  LOL!  I like your pen name.  Hehe, sry.  Don't go crazy!  Here's your chappie!

ThuperJ:  Yeah, it was short, but it was just the prologue…;-)

This chapter isn't really long either, just to warn you, but it's a reasonable length, so don't kill me!

Oh yeah, since I forgot to do it in the first chapter:

Disclaimer:  I think I may own some socs that I made up later on but other than that it's all S.E. Hinton's.  Don't sue me unless you want me to pay you in stuffed animals and jelly beans… ;-)

Oh yeah, and this chapter is kinda dark... but not even as dark as the next one… yeah this story is gonna be a little intense. Just to warn ya.  

On to the story!

"You're gonna be okay, Ponyboy," Darry murmured to his shaking brother, attempting to reassure him. 

"They're gonna kill him, Dar," Ponyboy cried, wringing the blanket in his fist. "It's all because of me.  It's my fault they took him."

"It's not your fault, Baby, so shut up.  We're gonna find him."

Another sleepless night.  Four days since Sodapop Curtis had disappeared.  The police were working on it.  The only hint as to what happened to him was the wrinkled note left outside the window where he had been forced through--and the desire for revenge the Socs had for the greasers.  The story was out.  Pony's theme had been published.  Many knew of the amazing circumstances the Curtises had survived.  And yet, still the revenge ran deep.  Bob Sheldon had been killed, and the Socs had not forgotten it.  

Darry glanced toward the dresser and spotted the wrinkled note.  Its scrawled ink words sent chills up his spine even after he had scrutinized it time and time again.  He practically had it memorized. 

_An eye for an eye._

_We swore you would die.  _

_But death is too small a punishment.  _

_Terror for fear._

_Anguish for pain.  _

_Horror for worry._

_Torture for abuse._

_Someone we respect is taken._

_We take someone you cherish._

_We repay you.  _

_But you get off too easy._

_A fox in a hole, wind in the trees. _

_ No mice to feed.  _

_A bear will enter, no sun will shine,_

_Revenge is too pitiful a word for your repayment this time._

The note had been examined by officials, it had been scrutinized by Steve, Two-Bit, Darry, Ponyboy, and even Cherry, and tests had been run for fingerprints. They clung to their only evidence, hoping that somehow Soda would be found.  

"Darry?"

"Yeah Pony?"

"How come I didn't wake up?"

Darry sighed.  "We've been over this, Pony.  No one knows.  They might've used sleeping gas or somethin'."

"But they said he struggled."

"You were out cold.  There's nothing you could have done."  Darry stared out the open window into the night sky.  It was the last place in the Curtis house Soda had touched for four days.  

"It freaks me out how creepy it is.  How they just took him."  Pony choked.  "And we don't even know who 'they' is."

"We're gonna find him.  He didn't go willingly.  They have ideas… they've questioned Bob's friends.  No one gave away anything.  Randy has been missing since yesterday." Darry responded.  

"Where they searchin' now?"

"Near Windrixville.  The hills."

"_Wind in the trees………It's not real windy there."  Pony said._

Darry glanced down at him.  "They haven't ruled anything out."

"I know it's not windy there.  I was there for a long time."  Darry rubbed Pony's hair.  "Yeah, I know.  Not many trees there either."  

"We should be out there with 'em, searching.  I hate thinking of what they could be doing to him."

"Go to sleep Pony.  They're gonna find him.  We can't keep our strength if we don't sleep."

Pony rolled over and Darry switched off the light.  He moved toward the door but was stopped when Pony said softly, "Dar?"

Darry sighed.  Another painful image flashed into his mind of Pony waking up that morning.  

_"Darry!__  Soda ran away!"_

_"What?"_

_"He's gone!"_

And the note… the open window….

"_What's this?"_

The tire screech marks.  They soon discovered that everything Soda owned was perfectly intact except the clothes he was wearing when they took him.  Thankfully he had gone to sleep fully clothed except for his shoes, too tired to change.  Pony said he remembered telling him to at least change, and Soda responding with "Nah…. Too tired…."

The last words he uttered before he was kidnapped.  

"Darry?"

Darry snapped back to reality. "Yeah Pon?" He answered.

"I'm scared.  I keep not feeling him next to me."

Darry clenched his teeth.  "I'm scared too Pony."  

_You'd better not touch him, _he spoke inwardly to Soda's enemies.  _Even if you don't have a life, he does.  We can't live without him.  If you hurt him........._

Darry wiped his face on his t-shirt sleeve.  _If we lose him we lose ourselves._

A/N:  REVIEW!!!!!!!!!!!

P.S.  Read my other Outsiders fic's!  But not before you review this one!


	3. Fox in a Hole

A/N:  FINALLY the next chapter!  Thanks for all the reviews!  If you have any questions about this chapter, I'll answer them when I update again.

On to the story…

*Soda* 

I never thought they would go this far.  

Indeed, we've been getting death-glares ever since the incident.  Don't they know we're hurt enough?  

They lost one of their own.  

Rich kids.  

Their parents aren't dead like mine are.  

No one deserves the kind of disdain we receive from them on a daily basis.  You'd think they would understand, but they don't.  "Pick on somebody else!" I want to scream. "Don't you know what we've been through?!  Can't you see that we only keep living because we have to?  All we have is each other!  And now you're tearing us apart!  What is this?!  What kind of warped world reduces us to scum on the streets, when already so many know what we have suffered?  You disgust me."

They all disgusted me.  The sympathy had been a false front.  For the press, for society.  But I have seen the glares they give my little brother as we're walking down the street.  Something in their eyes told me they wanted revenge.  

Well now they had it.  

I remember only short flashes of that night.  In my mind's eye I see the peaceful darkness, Ponyboy snoring softly beside me.  Then the window was smashed in.  

I try to block out the memories, but they come anyway.  

The baseball bat.

_"Look, he thinks he can take us.  Don't fight, greaser.  You're better off with us anyway."  _

Their cruel laughter.  The way Ponyboy had gone limp.  I fought. I fought for all I was worth.  But there were too many, and having just woken up is not exactly the best time to take three strong guys.  I remember them kicking me, laughing as they gagged me so no one would hear my shouts of pain as they dragged me through the broken window, the glass cutting into my side.  

They would never get away with this, I thought as they dragged me through the darkness.  They're crazy. No one takes a guy right out of his bedroom in the middle of the night.  

I remember staring into their insane grins as they smashed me into blackness with a broken pop bottle…

And I woke up here.  Here in more darkness.  I experienced the confusion waking up in the same place I have been for three days.  I was alone, I soon discovered, and the reality of how truly alone I am still scares me.

I was scared, and it took more than I wanted for me to admit it.  I had no idea where I was. It was a shack or barn, with sturdy wooden walls that reached farther upward than I could touch, even if I jumped.  A window let in musty sunlight.  Its bare, cramped interior and height made me feel as if I were in a prison cell.  I gulped and hit my fist on the dirt floor.  I was cold, so cold. 

I still am.  The shack was not large, but around fifteen square feet without any furniture or decoration or welcoming thing made it seems endless, empty, and frightening.  I stood, biting my teeth as I felt the recently sealed cuts on my side reopen.  I ran my tanned, shaking hands over the musty wood interior of the shack, even glancing toward the roof.  Had they built this shack just so someone could not get out?  The huge door was sealed shut, padlocked on the outside, probably.  I felt completely and utterly trapped.  

"This isn't real," I told myself.  "This is the kind of stuff they do in movies, old westerns.  No one drags someone to the middle of nowhere and leaves them in a shack…" I scared myself the way my voice rang out through the silence.  I sounded hoarse and scared.  "…To die." I finished dejectedly, slumping against the wall again.  

Were they coming back for me?  If they were, when?  

My wonder was short-lived.  Soon I heard fiddling with the lock, and I saw a black-haired young man with a black eye and otherwise pale skin creak open the door.  He was followed by two other boys, both Socs.  They wore jackets over their t-shirts.  I knew why; it was freezing outside.  All I wore was my short-sleeved DX work shirt over a white t-shirt.  My jeans were not made for sleeping in the cold.  My bare feet were cold too.  If I ever got home, I swore to start wearing shoes around the house.  Darry always told me that someday I would regret going barefoot so much.  I certainly did now.

"Well, well, well, doll-face just woke up," the black-haired Soc sneered, sizing me up from my slumped position against the wall of the shack.  It's the same way I've been for three days.  

"You see this?" He motioned to his black eye.  

"Yeah," I retorted distastefully, wishing whoever did it would do the other one in.  

"You did it.  Last night.  I hate to see a greaser get off easy." He moved toward me.  I braced myself.  Soon after, the three of them ran at me, pinning me against the wall.  I had never felt so defenseless before.  

That was the first time they beat me up.  Obviously they enjoyed hearing my cries of pain when I could not hold back the groans any longer.  Their shoes dug into my ribs, tearing my shirt.  My face was punched in.  My arms were twisted behind my back, just so they could hear me scream.  All the while they caused me pain, I felt it in my heart.  Words tore at me like daggers. 

 "I wish you could all die. We couldn't take all of you."  

"Umph," I grunted as the air was driven out of me again.  

"We didn't take Ponyboy because we wanted him to feel fear.  We wanted him to be scared of your face.  Believe me," he snapped my head back so I could barely see his eyes, dark with hate.  

"When they find you, dead," he sneered, "He'll be scared at your face.  Enjoy this.  It's the last time you'll ever have fun, pretty-boy."  

I fought with all my might.  Three against one is tough.

But that was not the first time.  

For three days they have entered, and each time I become less afraid to cower.  Each time I feel myself losing a little nerve, I know they know it.  With abuse beyond belief they take advantage of my fear.  

I'm a fighter… I _was _a fighter.  I prided myself in being able to whup just about anybody, besides Darry of course.  I'm muscular and lean, but Darry's about three inches taller than me and a whole lot bigger, so he loves to tackle me just to show who's boss.  At rumbles, I could take anyone my size down, and sometimes someone bigger than me.  But if I ever got in over my head, I could count on Darry running in and helping me out.  That was rare, and soemtimes I was frustrated I couldn't take them myself, but now I think it was tuff.  'Cause Darry was there to help me.  Now he's not here to stick up for me—now when I need him to protect me the most.  

I want to laugh again.  I want to be held.  I want to cry.  I want to lean against the counter at the DX and wink at the crowds of girls.  But all I feel now is pain and loneliness.  

  They told me I'll never see Ponyboy again, and when he saw me, I'd be dead.  I'm waiting for the day when I wish I will be dead, when I can't take it anymore.

When I can sleep, I do.  Sleep is the only time I can escape from the pain.  Even then nightmares haunt me, and the pain awakes me and I find that my reality is far worse than my nightmares.  

I still don't know where I am. All I know is pain.  

I feel like an abused animal, trapped in a lost fetter.  I know somewhere my brothers must be looking for me.  I wish they would find me.  But does anyone care what happens to me anymore?

My stomach growls.  I have had no food for three days.  My bloody tongue is swollen and it hurts to swallow. They sometimes give me drinks of water, around twice a day.  But it's always just a couple sips and they laugh as I beg for more. I don't care what they've reduced me to now.  What do they want?  What more sick pleasure can they get than hearing me scream?

Although I'm broken on the outside, I wonder how long it'll be before they break me on the inside too.  Somewhere within there is a plea for deliverance, a hope that safety will find me again.  I was happy before they ruined me.  

When I rock back and forth on the hard dirt, dreaming, I can hear some of the conversations I have had in the past that make me smile with cracked lips.  

They can break my body, but not my spirit.  I still love, I still hope, I still long for what I have not had for so long.  Just a drop of water, a slice of chocolate cake, an arm wrestling match with Steve, a sigh of content as I massage him from Darry, a joke from Two-Bit, a kiss from Sandy, a hug from Ponyboy.  

But I feel trapped from these things, like an animal in a cage, unable to see what's beyond.  

Sometimes danger comes and reduces me to a bloody, begging mess.  

That's what I feel like.  

A fox in a hole, with a bear coming.  

A/N:  Told you it would be intense… REVIEW please!!!!!!!!  (I'm going to count how many times people say "poor soda!" ;-)


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